Barbara Howard is an amazing individual. At the age of 16 and still a high school student in 1937, she participated in track time trials for the 1938 British Empire and Commonwealth Games to be staged in Sydney, Australia. Her time of 11.2 seconds at the Western Trials equaled the games record for 100 yards.

And so she was off to Sydney, a journey aboard ship that would take 28 days and make her the first black woman athlete to represent Canada in international competition. She finished fifth in the 100 yard final, probably tired out from that long voyage, but did return home with a silver medal for the 440 yard relay and a bronze medal for the 660 yard relay.

Barbara planned on redemption at the next Olympics in Berlin but the outbreak of war kept her home. After graduation, she went on to earn a teaching degree and become the first person from a visible minority to be hired as a teacher by the Vancouver School Board, a career that spanned 43 years, 14 of them as a Physical Education teacher.

She still works out regularly at the Confederation Seniors Centre, remarkable in the fact she turns 91 this May, 2011.